


of always thinking you would be real

by Coeurire



Series: FSF Tarot Prompt Table Challenge [6]
Category: Grey's Anatomy
Genre: Angst, Community: femslashficlets, F/F, Ficlet, Fluff and Angst, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-05
Updated: 2020-08-05
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:55:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25733185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Coeurire/pseuds/Coeurire
Summary: Meredith enters her office at the end of what has become a thirty-hour day, ready to collapse. Someone is asleep there. Someone who looks familiar. But it can't be, can it?
Relationships: Meredith Grey/Cristina Yang
Series: FSF Tarot Prompt Table Challenge [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1795486
Comments: 4
Kudos: 63
Collections: femslashficlets: tarot prompt challenge





	of always thinking you would be real

**Author's Note:**

> Written for femslashficlets' tarot cards prompt challenge. 
> 
> Prompt: The Hanged Man - Great personal sacrifice that still doesn't hurt much.

“Call it?” 

The intern twitched, bringing his hands together. “Um, are you sure? I...I’ve never…” 

“Forget it.” Meredith sighed, looking down at her own watch. Normally she’d encourage the kid, or snap at them, or  _ something,  _ but she didn’t have it in her today. “Time of death: 3:47 a.m.” 

She wanted to slump down on the table, deceased patient and all. Thirty hours. She’d been awake for thirty hours, and she wanted to say it didn’t affect her as a surgeon. She wanted to say that, desperately. But she couldn’t. She had done everything in her power to save this patient, but she’d have so much more power to use if she had just a little more control of her mental faculties. 

And in those thirty hours, this had been her fourth death. Cardiac arrest, risky cancer surgery, suicide attempt, and now, car crash victim. The air was thick with it: the smell, the feeling, hanging heavy like the fog outside. Meredith couldn’t even make herself care about anything enough to take herself home. She ambled to her office, shut the door tightly and locked it, and was about to pass out on the floor, when she realized there was someone asleep in her chair. Someone with a head of soft, wavy dark hair and gentle grey roots. Meredith felt a pang in her gut. The sleeping stranger reminded her of someone she hadn’t seen in a long time, someone with hair she loved to stroke and lips she’d used to stare at as she talked. 

Cristina. Her person. She’d moved away, what was it, five years ago now? Six? She couldn’t remember, even without a foggy head, because she didn’t like to think about it. She hadn’t understood how she felt about Cristina until long after it didn’t matter anymore. 

She cleared her head, and her throat. “Can I help you?” It was meant to come out as intimidating, but it was weak, exhausted, pathetic. 

Then the dark-haired person started, and sat up, and all at once Meredith was stepping backwards, back banging against the closed door. 

“No fucking way. You’re in Switzerland.” 

“I quit,” said Cristina Yang, blinking the sleep from her eyes. 

Meredith’s jaw dropped. She wanted to be happy to see her, but what had happened? She had  _ quit?  _ Meredith would kill-- _ deliberately this time, _ she thought darkly, pained by the day’s lost patients--to get the position Cristina had taken.

“What?” she gasped. “Why?” 

Cristina’s tone was matter-of-fact. “Do you want the work reason or the real reason?” 

Meredith stared at her. “Work first.” 

“I got a job offer,” Cristina said flatly. “Chief of General Surgery at UW Medical Center. Pays fine, definitely what I’m used to.” 

“But that’s...that’s a huge step down.”  _ Cristina, I knew you were an idiot, but not that big of an idiot.  _ Who would make that kind of a sacrifice? And for what? 

Cristina looked at her, and Meredith saw tears shining in her eyes. She was shocked. Cristina never cried. She’d barely cried through the worst things that had happened to her, barely cried when Meredith had held her through them. And she was crying now. 

“Cristina…” Meredith whispered. “What happened in Switzerland?” 

Cristina looked down, shaking her head. “Nothing. It’s not like that,” she said. ‘I just…” She trailed off. Meredith tried to meet her eyes, but Cristina avoided them, and a single tear dripped from the tip of her nose onto the floor. 

“Wow, jeez. I hate doing feelings,” she said. “And I hate crying. This sucks. But the truth is.” She sighed. “I couldn’t stop thinking about you. For seven years, I couldn’t stop thinking about you, Mere. And I had to be close to you again. I...I love you, Meredith, but I also  _ want _ you, Meredith, do you understand?” She finally raised her eyes. They were bleary, tears now running down both of her cheeks. 

Meredith opened her mouth, not sure what she was going to say, but Cristina held up her hands. “Even if you don’t want me in your life anymore after hearing that. Even if this is all just too much for you. Even if I just made things weird and shitty. It’s enough to just...to just be near you.” She chuckled, and stood from Meredith’s chair. “That’s all. I can go now if you want.” 

“Cristina…” Meredith didn’t know what to say. 

“Actually, no,” Cristina said. “Don’t tell me to go. Please. This is me asking you not to tell me to go. As your friend. As--something. I don’t know.” She crossed her arms. “I don’t like doing shit like this.” 

“I would have gone to Switzerland for you,” Meredith whispered. 

Cristina’s eyes widened, despite herself. 

“And I…” She looked around the room. She thought about her boyfriend, the boyfriend Cristina _knew_ about. The life she’d built for herself. “I wish you’d done this sooner.”   
“So is that a yes or a no?” 

“It’s a…” Meredith paused to think. Cristina stepped around the desk, and put her hands on Meredith’s arms, a gesture so familiar and so calming that Meredith started to cry. 

“It’s, God, Cristina.” Meredith laughed. “It’s a ‘I wish you’d done this sooner so I could have dumped him ages ago and flown out to Switzerland and kissed you.” It had been a long day. “And I wish you weren’t doing this now. Not while I haven’t slept. Not while I’m a mess. I’m not supposed to be like this when you first...when you first…” She tried to organize her thoughts. “When you…” 

“When I do this?” Cristina whispered. 

Her lips moved against Meredith’s in the way Meredith had always dreamed she would. They were so soft, tasting like salt, her hands roaming across Meredith’s back slowly, savoring her, drinking her in, in the way Meredith had always wanted. 

“What the hell are we gonna do?” Meredith whispered against her mouth. 

Cristina could only laugh, softly. “We’ll figure it out.” 


End file.
